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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23724136">that one tree fic</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account'>orphan_account</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Childhood, Fluff, Minor Injuries, i mean its a broken bone but, minor story-wise</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 22:46:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,970</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23724136</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"I don't think this is a good idea."</p>
<p>"You don't think ANY of my ideas are good ideas."</p>
<p>"That's because they aren't."</p>
<p>Caspar tries to climb a tree. Shenanigans ensue.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Caspar von Bergliez &amp; Linhardt von Hevring</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>that one tree fic</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>"I don't think this is a good idea."</p>
<p>"You don't think ANY of my ideas are good ideas."</p>
<p>"That's because they aren't."</p>
<p>Caspar's head turns to him then, enough so that Linhardt can see the way his face scrunches when his tongue sticks out, the wrinkles bunching up around his nose, somehow having enough energy to be mocking when he's hanging halfway off a tree trunk like some sort of drunken monkey. He just doesn't get it. Though this is far from the first time Caspar has done something like this (they've been friends their whole lives, which is effectively about eleven years now), it never gets any more understandable than it gets simply 'usual'. After all, it's a lovely day out. It's sometime during summer, if he remembers their daily calendar correctly, with golden sunlight pouring through the openings in the leaves, illuminating the forest floor beneath them, birds almost certainly waiting amongst ancient branches to sing their songs - if they weren't already so distracted by what must be the animal equivalent of a one-man-circus: a featherless, furless boy trying to pull himself up a tree, wrapping his body around it and scrambling up like a squirrel, except with none of the speed, stamina, or success. </p>
<p>All in all, it's the perfect day for a nap, or so Linhardt believes. Why would he bother climbing a tree, anyway, risking the possibility of splinters or dirty clothes or other offensive injuries, when he could just sleep under it and enjoy their time off from school?</p>
<p>It's science, in a way, observing Caspar like this, learning how to deal with him in a way that's beneficial to the both of them - but this just seems like a bad idea, and there's no science for bad ideas. That, he figures, is just called being dumb.</p>
<p>His friend Caspar just so happens to be very dumb.</p>
<p>"Aren't you coming up here with me?" Caspar asks, and for a moment, Linhardt almost considers it. There's a look in his eyes not unlike the dogs he sees on those charity commercials sometimes, but at the same time, he knows Caspar is much too energetic to ever sit in one place and pout for too long. He always has to keep going, like a shark, or a hummingbird. The second he stops moving, Linhardt guesses, his heart will stop, he'll fall to the ground, curl up, and die, just like they do. Linhardt feels bad for those animals, but not so much for Caspar.</p>
<p>"No. But you could come back down here." Linhardt points out, holding the same tired tone he usually has. He remembers his parents being concerned about it, at first. Certainly, there must have been something wrong with him, a child so specific and lethargic, but after numerous, probably expensive tests, the doctors ended up prescribing him as being just 'like that', to both his parent's relief and subsequent dismay. "Why do you want to get up there so bad, anyway? There's nothing up there."</p>
<p>"You don't get it, Lin." Caspar turns away from him just as he frowns at the name. Linhardt isn't one to use nicknames, much, or at least he uses them far less than he simply categorizes the people he meets, but Caspar has a nickname for everyone and everything. "It's not about what's up there. It's about what's -not- up there. Like me."</p>
<p>Linhardt doesn't have anything to say to that, mostly because it didn't make sense, but that seems to be Caspar's talent nowadays - making so little sense that he manages to stump even Linhardt, who, as far as he's concerned, is a rocket scientist compared to Caspar. So, for both of their sakes, he keeps quiet, watching as Caspar regains his footing on the tree and, stretching out one of his arms, manages to grab hold of a neighboring branch and pull himself up onto it.</p>
<p>"I bet it's 'cause you're scared." Caspar continues, because, just like his body, if his mouth ever stops moving, he's sure not going to be able to recover from it. "You know, it's not so scary, Lin. It's easy. Come up and I'll teach you."</p>
<p>"Wouldn't you have to teach me before I started climbing?" Linhardt asks.</p>
<p>"Well… maybe. But I'm already up here. It'd be a waste of time to come back down now." And with that, Caspar flashes him a toothy smile - minus one, that is, ever since he got knocked in the mouth playing baseball with his brothers, but to be fair, it looks much better than it did then. When he'd run up to Linhardt with the thing, blood still stuck to the root and even more of it coming from his mouth, he…</p>
<p>Well, he doesn't remember much, because he's pretty sure he passed out, and when he woke up, the tooth was gone and Caspar's brand new, somewhat flawed smile was there, looking over him from his bed as if there wasn't a care in the world.</p>
<p>"I'll just watch."</p>
<p>"You're real lame, you know that?" Caspar says, and maybe it's true. Caspar is, after all, terribly honest when it comes to anything other than getting himself in trouble.</p>
<p>Regardless, it doesn't stop him for long, and soon the drums start playing and the band starts marching as the blue-haired boy begins making his way back up the tree, higher and higher. He's up to one branch, two branches, three. The trees here are unbelievably high. They've been around longer than even their parents, Linhardt would assume. He wonders what they've seen. What they could prove if they could talk.</p>
<p>"Maybe next time, I'll make you-"</p>
<p>Caspar never finishes his sentence. It happens quickly. There's a crack and a rustle, and suddenly it seems like the whole canopy is coming down on top of them in a rain of splinters and leaves. Even the birds seem to cry out in shock and horror, if Linhardt remembers correctly, taking off into the skies to save themselves from the same fate. Linhardt himself flinches, taking a step back from the site of the catastrophe, and when he manages to bring himself back to reality, it's from a whimper.</p>
<p>When he opens his eyes, he sees Caspar on the ground, lying amongst what remains of the brain he had been putting his footing on, his hand clutching his elbow against his chest painfully, curled up in a ball as if there was some way to protect himself from what was already very much there. He rushes over, but when he gets there, he's silent. What is he supposed to say? What is he supposed to do?</p>
<p>There are tears in Caspar's eyes when he looks up at him. This is wrong. Caspar never cries.</p>
<p>"I- I think I broke it…"</p>
<p>Linhardt doesn't grace him with a response in favor of turning his gaze back onto their wounded arm. It's red and angry already, and even more terrifying is the fact it seems to go limp past the elbow - he must have hit it there on impact, and who knows what that means.</p>
<p>At least there isn't any blood.</p>
<p>He thinks about running to get his parents, but he can't. That isn't right. Not while Caspar is looking at him, as if he knows what to do, as if he can fix his arm and get the pain to stop, as if Linhardt can help him.</p>
<p>He hates it.</p>
<p>He dips down to where Caspar is, and slips an arm under him, helping to maneuver him up from the ground. He's too small - or at least, their heights and weights are too similar - to carry him, but he manages to settle Caspar so that he's leaning against him as they stand, and the whole time he can hear Caspar's whimpers and whines. It must really hurt. Their tears are coming faster now, and their arm seems to get redder by the second, and then…</p>
<p>Linhardt only looks at Caspar when he begins muttering about how he's okay, how he's fine and for Linhardt - Lin - not to worry, how it's still not that scary, a thousand 'I told you so's stuck on his tongue.</p>
<p>When they finally manage to get back to Linhardt's house, it's a panic when his parents lay their eyes on Caspar. They're nice people, mostly, and friends with Caspar's family more importantly, so the fact that this blame is automatically placed on them makes them frantic. He hears arguing in the car ride to the hospital, but he doesn't actually pick up much besides the occasional 'we have to call them' and 'we'll do that later'. He's more focused on watching Caspar, who is, after all this time, still crying, still holding his arm, still in pain.</p>
<p>The sight never quite leaves him.</p>
<p>-</p>
<p>"My parents say I'm not allowed out by the trees anymore."</p>
<p>"That makes sense."</p>
<p>The night at the hospital was a long one. Linhardt wasn't allowed to be in the room whenever they were doing whatever it is they did to Caspar's arm, but it never left his mind, even when his mother took him out for some fresh air and a makeshift dinner from the waiting area, their actual dinner left unfinished and untouched back at home.</p>
<p>"I'm going to be a doctor," He remembers telling her. He's not sure why he said it then, but the feeling of hopelessness, the guilt of not being able to help, waiting outside of the room instead of being there <br/> Caspar, helping, since it's somewhat his fault anyway, for not talking him down and for not watching which branch he was picking himself up onto, and he doesn't want to ever go through that again.</p>
<p>"That's good, Linhardt. I'm sure he'd like that." His mother says, and that was the end.</p>
<p>When they're finally released from the hospital, Caspar goes home with his family and Linhardt with his, but it's not long before Linhardt is back over at Caspar's anyway, because the two are damn near inseparable if nothing else. Caspar is lying in his bed, looking miserable, a brand new cast on his arm. Now that the pain is mostly gone, the only thing that seems to worry Caspar now is the fact that his new injury has put an end to most of his summer playtime - no baseball, no climbing, no general horsing around until it's healed.</p>
<p>Caspar gives him a look at his response, and Linhardt shrugs.</p>
<p>"Sorry." He says, though he doesn't much feel it for the response as he does for the look.</p>
<p>"I'm bored, Lin." Caspar huffs, pushing himself up against his bed like a puppy having a temper tantrum. "Why can't this heal faster? They said it wasn't as bad as it looked, but here I am in total lockdown. This sucks."</p>
<p>"You could have died."</p>
<p>"It's a broken arm, Lin."</p>
<p>"Could've been your head."</p>
<p>"Nah, that wouldn't have killed me either. My brother says I'm too thick up there anyway."</p>
<p>And with that, Caspar is giving him that same goofy, crooked smile, and it makes Linhardt feel a little better, even if he's not the one with a broken arm and a nursery bed.</p>
<p>"Hey, Lin." Caspar starts, and when Linhardt looks back, he's holding out a marker to him. "Sign my cast? You'll have to go home soon, anyway, and I don't know when they'll let me come back over since I'm grounded and all. It's going to be boring here, no games, no phone, no you."</p>
<p>"You're not good with phones, anyway," Linhardt remarks, which gets a laugh from Caspar as he takes the marker from their hand, popping off the cap and leaning over the bed to get a better angle on their cast.</p>
<p>"Thanks," Caspar says, and somehow, Linhardt can tell he means it when he takes the marker away. "Hey, whenever you break your arm next, I'll be sure to return the favor."</p>
<p>"I'm not going to break my arm."</p>
<p>"Sure you are. We do everything together, right Lin?"</p>
<p>Linhardt looks at him, at the cast on his arm, the missing tooth in his smile, the mess of his hair and the blue of his eyes.</p>
<p>"Sure." He says. "I guess we do."</p>
<p>-</p>
<p>He doesn't end up breaking his arm, actually, but it does give him a better idea.</p>
<p>"A treehouse?"</p>
<p>"It's for Caspar." Linhardt points out. "So he doesn't try to climb trees anymore. He's going to try again when he comes over, you know, so we should make it safer. A treehouse is safer."</p>
<p>"I would think it would be your responsibility to keep your friend out of trouble, Linhardt." His father raises a brow at him, looking inquisitive from under his glasses - interested, Linhardt notes, not opposed.</p>
<p>"He's Caspar."</p>
<p>"A treehouse sounds nice. We have a big tree in the backyard." His mother advocates.</p>
<p>"I'm not much of a carpenter."</p>
<p>"So hire someone," Linhardt says plainly. "We have money. It'll be like a birthday present."</p>
<p>There's a moment of silence.</p>
<p>"I'll look into it." His father says. "Now finish your dinner."</p>
<p>And that's how Linhardt knows it's a yes.</p>
<p>-</p>
<p>"Close your eyes."</p>
<p>"Why, Lin?" Caspar complains. It's about two months after the incident, and since then, Caspar's arm has healed up nicely - if in exchange for being more annoying than ever. "I've been over here tons of times."</p>
<p>"Just close them," Linhardt repeats, and, with a begrudging sigh, Caspar finally relents, bringing his hands up to cover his eyes as Linhardt pushes him along, leading him through the old creak of their backyard gate.</p>
<p>The treehouse was completed rather quickly, as far as construction projects go, but Linhardt's family is rich and their paychecks more volatile than most, so he supposes it makes sense. He's only been inside enough to test it out and make sure everything fits, but other than that, it's a mystery to even him. His mother went in and decorated it, he thinks, but he hasn't seen what she's done, so it's as much of a surprise to Linhardt as it is to Caspar, really.</p>
<p>One of them, however, took surprises a lot more seriously.</p>
<p>"Oh, wow!" Caspar shouts, and Linhardt recoils away, one hand moving to cover his ear.</p>
<p>"I didn't say to open them."</p>
<p>"When did you get a treehouse, Lin?"</p>
<p>"Recently." He answers. He leaves out the part about it being made for Caspar intentionally because Goddess knows he doesn't need that to be filling up Caspar's head. "I haven't been inside yet."</p>
<p>"Well, come on! We gotta go check it out." And with that, he's off, making a beeline right for the ladder with the speed of a kid who didn't just recover from breaking his arm for a very similar thing. Linhardt is slow to follow him in comparison, and by the time he makes it to the bottom of the ladder, he can already hear Caspar's excited shouting from the house above.</p>
<p>"Come on, Lin!"</p>
<p>"Coming."</p>
<p>He has to hand it to his mother - if there's one thing she knows, it's interior decorating. Of course, she knows more than that, but when you have more money than you know what to do with, you often end up spending it on meaningless decorations rather than anything else. The treehouse is decorated in their colors, blue and green and all that fits in between, just like Linhardt and Caspar. It's cozy, but he doesn't think his mother could stand to make anything feel too 'rustic', so it's refined, too. Not that he thinks Caspar really notices the decoration, but judging by the look on his face, it doesn't matter. He's excited enough.</p>
<p>"This place is huge!" He exclaims once he's sure that his friend has followed him, unlike the last time. Linhardt watches as he makes his way over to a nearby hammock and practically throws himself on top of it, the thing swinging in motion with him, and somehow Linhardt thinks even this place won't be enough to stop Caspar from hurting himself after all.</p>
<p>To be fair, it is huge. There are at least two tiers to it, with a bridge on the other end leading to another platform with a swing and working lights, so there must be electrical outlets here, too. Everything a kid could want.</p>
<p>"We could live here," Caspar says as Linhardt takes a seat in a beanbag near him, looking over at a large bookshelf on the opposite wall - for him more than for Caspar, probably.</p>
<p>"We already live somewhere."</p>
<p>"Yeah, but this could be just us. For now, the treehouse… And, when we're adults, we can get our own house. Maybe your parents will let you have this one, so then we can have both. Wouldn't that be cool? Just you and I. My family probably wouldn't miss me much anyway."</p>
<p>Linhardt gives him a look.</p>
<p>"In a good way," Caspar reassures, rocking himself on the hammock as if to emphasize his ease.</p>
<p>For the sake of cooperation, Linhardt tries to imagine it. After all, he spends most of his life with Caspar anyway, doesn't he? Living together officially wouldn't be much different. At most, they'd have to worry about adult things like rent and interest and what food to buy, but it never seems difficult for their parents. He thinks they could manage, or at least, he could manage for both himself and Caspar.</p>
<p>"So, what do you say?" Caspar asks again.</p>
<p>Linhardt watches him for a moment, taking in the sway of his hammock, the slight bounce in his knee as he rests his foot against the fabrics, the gleam of hope in his eyes as he watches Linhardt for their reaction.</p>
<p>"Sure." He finally says, feeling the corner of his lips tug up into a rare smile. "Why not?"</p>
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